Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Last week, as Members know, I attended a celebration for Elizabeth Greenland who had her 95th birthday. It dawned on me at the event, when I looked around the Ingamo Hall and saw all the elders who were in attendance and the long-term care facility staff that brought all the elders from the hospital to celebrate in these celebrations – and many of them participated in the dancing and the feast – they had looks of joy on their faces, happiness, and they looked alive.

As we stand up here today on Pink Shirt Day, what dawned on me on that day was it was great to have a lot of the elders there, but we were still missing a few. We were missing some that might have been caused from death, but what I want to talk about today is the abuse and the neglect that our people have committed on some of our seniors in the small communities.

I’ve brought it up before, Mr. Speaker. These can be of all natures: financial, verbal, physical, psychological. They can do things to elders that make the elder feel guilty, when we should be celebrating their life and their existence. Because our elders are the keepers of traditional knowledge, culture and language and, just as important, they have the history, stories of a past that we don’t have, and this is an opportunity for us to celebrate that, to talk to them, to engage them, to help them live that life longer and more independently.

So, last week when I was at the celebrations, I was glad to see all the elders that were there. A really good suggestion or remarks that were given to me by another elder is, they said, “Listen to your elders because they don’t have much time left on this earth,” and to listen to the elders because they have the stories to tell, they have the information that they want to give you so you can carry it on and pass it on to your children or to other people in the Northwest Territories and to the school and education systems.

Today I just want to talk about our senior population, and I want to encourage anybody who sees any of this type of abuse on their elders in the communities, speak up, talk to the authorities, talk to people that can help, whether it’s a social worker or a teacher or some type of other authority and make sure that it’s addressed now. Thank you, Mr. Speaker.